Plaintiff was employed by Hewitt from August 2000 to November
2001 as a customer service associate ("CSA"). As a CSA, Plaintiff
administered health and retirement benefit plans to Hewitt's
clients. Initially, Plaintiff worked on a client team serving
Morgan Stanley, but because that team was phased out, Plaintiff
transferred to a client team serving Xerox Corporation in February 2001. Plaintiff was trained to use the
policies and procedures specific to Morgan Stanley and later to
Xerox.

B. Plaintiff's Supervision Under Steve Bryant

When Plaintiff transferred to the Xerox client service team she
remained under the supervision of Sarah Raines through April
2001, and in May 2001 Steve Bryant became her supervisor. While
under Mr. Bryant's supervision, Plaintiff was rated on a monthly
basis by a coach who would monitor her calls. Her scores were
based on (1) the accuracy of the information she provided to the
caller, and (2) the manner in which she communicated with the
caller, a performance factor referred to as "MAGIC," which stands
for "Making A Good Impression on the Customer." MAGIC skills
entail greeting a caller appropriately, using a caller's name
throughout the call, and thanking the caller at the end.

Hewitt's supervisors are expected to review their associates
once a month to discuss their performance. Mr. Bryant met with
Plaintiff in May 2001 and told Plaintiff that her MAGIC and
accuracy scores were unsatisfactory and that she needed to
improve her scores immediately. (Bryant Decl. ¶ 18.) However,
Plaintiff responded that she had never been given formal training
in MAGIC skills at the time of this review and her former
supervisor, Ms. Raines, had informed Mr. Bryant of this fact.
(Beamon Dep. at 36-37, 42-44.)

Mr. Bryant did not meet with Plaintiff in June 2001, stating
that they could not meet because Plaintiff was on vacation during
the scheduled meeting. (Bryant Decl. ¶ 19.) Mr. Bryant did meet
with other Xerox employees on a monthly basis. (Pl.'s Am. Resp.
to Local R. 56.1 Stmt. ¶ 18.) In July and August of 2001, Plaintiff met with Mr. Bryant for
their monthly performance meetings. In July 2001 Mr. Bryant
informed Plaintiff her MAGIC scores were very low, though her
accuracy scores were improving. (Bryant Decl. ¶ 20.) Plaintiff
had still not yet been properly trained on MAGIC skills. At their
August 2001 meeting, Mr. Bryant informed Plaintiff that she was
still performing at a below satisfactory level. (Bryant Decl. ¶
21.) Mr. Bryant then claims he arranged for additional coaching
to help Plaintiff improve. (Id.) However, Plaintiff did not
receive a coach until October 2001 when she was placed on the
performance improvement plan. (Beamon Dep. at 46.) Mr. Bryant did
not meet with Plaintiff during the month of September 2001.

C. Performance Improvement Plan

On October 16, 2001, Plaintiff was placed on a sixty-day
performance improvement plan because she was still having
problems with her MAGIC skills. Plaintiff reminded Mr. Bryant she
had not received a coach pursuant to their August 2001 meeting
and a coach was assigned to provide additional training and
information regarding how she could improve her phone calls. The
coach sat with Plaintiff approximately one hour a week, listened
to her calls and provided immediate review. Plaintiff now also
met once a week with Mr. Bryant so that he could closely monitor
her performance and improvement rate.

D. Security Policies

At a Xerox team meeting in August 2001, months before Plaintiff
fielded a similar call, Mr. Bryant informed the team that an
employee had transferred funds without verifying a caller's password and that this mistake had cost Hewitt's client, Xerox, a
lot of money. (Beamon Dep. at 113.) At this meeting Mr. Bryant
stated that if these mistakes continued to occur, people would
get written up and it would be held against them on their
reviews. (Id.)

On October 17, 2001, Brian Doyle, one of Hewitt's senior
executives, sent an email to all associates, including Plaintiff,
which emphasized the importance of maintaining security of the
confidential information of their clients' employees. This email
stated that all associates were to follow the current security
procedures and if an associate did not know what the procedures
were, he was to contact his manager.

In Plaintiff's case, the security policy to which she was
subject was the Xerox Security Policy dated October 1, 2001,
which requires Xerox participants to provide their Social
Security number and passwords (PIN) in order to access
confidential information or to process transactions on the
internet or through IVR, the automated voice-response system.
(Bryant Decl. ¶ 16.) This security policy, although drafted by
Xerox, was distributed to Hewitt's employees on Hewitt
letterhead. (Beamon Dep. Ex. 3.)

At her deposition, Plaintiff confirmed her knowledge of the
information contained in the October 1, 2001 Xerox Security
Policy. Plaintiff explained that Xerox's security policy required
a participant to manually enter his Social Security number and
PIN on his telephone keypad before he could speak with a Hewitt
CSA regarding specific information about his account. If the
caller did not have his Social Security number and PIN, a CSA
could only provide general information. A CSA was immediately
aware of whether a Xerox employee had manually entered his PIN
before the call was routed to the CSA because when the CSA pulled
up the caller's information on her computer screen, the screen
would appear white if the caller had already entered his PIN into the phone system. ...

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